No chance to mourn its passing: Ostaglia for the GDR

Germany is now in economic distress; the Socialist-Green coalition
in power is selling off public assets and dismantling the social
welfare system. Unemployment, especially in what was East Germany, is
high. No wonder the Easterners are nostalgic for their protected
past.

GEORGE Tabori recently staged Gotthold Lessing’s The Jews for
the Berliner Ensemble and added a few lines of his own: Ah, the
good old days—alas, long gone, by the grace of God. Was he
thinking of Ostalgia, the ambivalent nostalgia felt by many former
citizens of East Germany (1)?

Marianne Birthler presides over a mound of paper, old files belonging
to the Stasi, the state security arm of the former German Democratic
Republic (GDR). She says about the Ostalgic movie Good Bye, Lenin!:
I have happy memories of particular tunes or objects. But I
don’t feel any nostalgia for the GDR. She thinks Ostalgia is
a reaction by those who think any criticism of socialism undermines
their own life history. Sigmund Jähn, a former cosmonaut who was
president of East Germany in Good Bye, Lenin!, sees Ostalgia as
the expression of an American-style lack of true culture. They
[West Germans] focus on making money . . . leaving East Germans to
calm down, stewing in their own juice.

Professor Jens Reich (2) does not dispute his fellow citizens’
attachment to their past but sees it as a passing fad exaggerated
by the media. After the fall of the Berlin wall those in favour of
democratic transformation of the GDR, including the Greens, only
picked up 5% of votes. He adds: The remaining 95%, who wanted an
end to communism, shouted us down. He thinks Ostalgia marks the
deliberate, collective end of an epoch. The last chance to
reform communism had been wrecked in 1968 when Soviet forces crushed
the Prague spring.

The writer Thomas Brussig says the GDR disappeared without us
having a chance to mourn its passing. Ostalgia is a delayed reaction
. . . Nostalgia is part of human nature. Everyone likes to remember
their youth. The passing of time makes everything rosier.
Particularly as the official line is that there was nothing worth
keeping in the GDR besides the green arrow traffic signal
(3). Brigitte Rauschenbach, a lecturer at the Freie Universität
Berlin, is convinced that mourning will never be complete until
former East Germans acknowledge the ambivalence of their feelings
about the regime. In 1945 people felt a subconscious mixture of
love and hate for Hitler. Ostalgia, she adds, is more like
unfocused melancholy.

Jana Hensel had a major success with her book Zonenkinder (4), which
she believes helped to bridge the gap between individual and
collective memories: her fellow citizens at last realised that
their story was not of marginal interest but a key
issue. Whether they stayed in the East or moved West, each is
trying to find traces of the GDR in songs, food or broadcasts.

Surprisingly Egon Krenz, the last president of the GDR, now out of
prison (5), is dismissive. In his modest home on the Baltic coast he
starts by emphasising the negative side of Ostalgia. Rather than
really testing memories, it is a caricature . . . making fun of
life in the GDR. Stefan Arndt, the producer of Good Bye, Lenin!,
uses the same term: People caricature things, saying ‘Their
cola was awful,’ ‘They never had any bananas’ or
‘That ghastly wallpaper’ but there’s no mention of
real life. Krenz acknowledges that there is a good side to
Ostalgia: People who lived in the East have experienced two types
of society and can compare them. At least 17 million people know
there was more to the GDR than Trabants or the Stasi . . . Despite
all the things that turned out badly everyone had work, with cheap
housing and a good health service free of charge . . . They miss all
those benefits.

Peter Ensikat, a cabaret artist, sees the trend as a reaction to
what has happened since the wall came down. People in the East
threw everything away without thinking . . . All they wanted was
to join West Germany, though they knew nothing about it beyond its ads
on television.

So perhaps the nostalgia is a combination of disappointment with the
present and longing for the past. Wolfgang Herr, a journalist, says:
The more you get to know capitalism the less inclined you are to
wonder what was wrong with socialism. Cynics will comment that
this is because he used to work for the communist daily Neues
Deutschland. But many Ossis say it wasn’t all so bad then and
it’s not that great now. We spoke to two other journalists,
Gerhard Leo, 81, and his grandson Maxim, 34. Gerhard thinks Ostalgia
reflects the rejection of the new society by a steadily increasing
number of East Germans, who are so desperate they forget the
shortcomings of the GDR. Maxim justifies a legitimate desire to
defend a lifestyle that has disappeared but also refers to
memories of a GDR that never existed. Gerhard thinks that the
socialist principle of secur ity for all should apply in western
society. Maxim disagrees, convinced it came at too high a price in
freedom and efficiency: Security rhymes with mediocrity. If you
deny people success, you stifle the driving force behind society. If
they achieve prosperity it can be redistributed afterwards.

Christian Schletze, a young member of the IG Metall trade union, is
still looking for the rosy future promised by Chancellor Helmut
Kohl. He says: The economy in my area was destroyed and with the
shortage of funds the schools, health service and arts centres no
longer work properly. What happened to the 1,250bn invested in the
Länder of the former GDR, where there are now only 6m jobs, compared
with 9.7m in 1989? Journalist Renate Marschall remembers how people
were convinced hard work was all that was needed and how hurt they
were to discover the truth. They were told: We don’t need
your skills any more. We have no use for you. Instead of the
promised 30 years of prosperity and growth they had 10 years of
disaster.

Rita Kuczynski has published two collections of interviews with former
Ossis (6). She thinks reunification marked the beginning of the end
for the welfare state and sees a similarity between the present
stagnation of the GDR and the Federal Republic of Germany in the
1980s. That is why there is no justification for Ostalgia: Why
did 4 million people move out? It went bankrupt.

Irene Dolling, a teacher at Potsdam University, says of women’s
rights: In the East women went out to work; in the West they stay
home and mind the kids. In the GDR women had to do much of the
housework too, but rising unemployment and the disappearance of many
kindergartens has undermined the relative liberation of work: In
the GDR 86% of all women worked. Now only 56% do. The birth rate
has been halved in 15 years, plummeting to the 1929 level. Stefan
Arndt says: Single mothers with kids managed quite well in the
GDR. Now they are in danger of falling into the poverty trap. Even if
they manage to find a space in a kindergarten, it opens at 9am and
closes at 2pm. You can’t make a living working only three or
four hours a day.

Reich thinks Ossis miss a peaceful, congenial lifestyle without
competition, hinging on the family much more than the welfare
system: during morning and afternoon breaks at work everyone had a
chance to chat. Wolfgang Engler, lecturer in the sociology of culture
at a drama school, explains: East Germans adjusted very well to a
collective lifestyle including their workplace and the
kindergarten. Their ego could flourish between individual and
collective demands, with the group having to strike a balance at all
times. Too much pressure from the authorities threatened the
group. Too much pressure from below threatened the state. He adds:
The awareness of togetherness nourished a sense of solidarity.

And security, adds Pascal Thibault, a French journalist working in
Berlin. He believes that because of their history Germans have come to
fear the future. He explains: For the French the worst is never
certain to happen, for the Germans it’s always a
possibility. What Ossis miss most is the tranquillity of the GDR,
described by writer Volker Braun as the most boring country in the
world. But says Enkisat, it’s a boredom that the homeless,
jobless and temporary workers really miss. It was a niche
society. Everyone, providing they stayed within limits, could enjoy
a safe, mediocre existence without being bothered by the system
. . . It was easier then to escape the pressures of bureaucracy than
it is now to avoid the pressures of money. Ossis feel just as
powerless as before. Enkisat concludes: Of course we can make a
fuss, but what’s the point?

Almost no one referred to the wall and the Stasi. Those most hostile
to the communist regime talked of a second dictatorship, although the
comparison is absurd. (The first dictatorship of the Nazi regime, and
the second world war, killed 60 million people, including several
million genocide victims.) Birthler’s statistics are impressive,
though: drawing on an army of informers (perhaps 2% of the nation),
the Stasi compiled some 40m files whose contents covered half the
population. There were 250,000 political prisoners.

If you weren’t politically active you never met the
Stasi, says Marie Borkowski, the widow of a dissident who spent
many years in prison. People were exclusively concerned with their own
affairs and knew nothing of what was going on. Kuczynski agrees that
it was possible to spend your whole life without problems, providing
you played by the rules. Brussig agrees: All you had to do was not
attract attention, not tell jokes against the system. According to
Herr: Telling jokes about Honecker [Communist party leader for many
years] could lead to serious trouble, but calling your foreman at work
a fool was OK. Nowadays anyone can call [Chancellor] Schröder names,
but not their supervisor, unless they want to get the sack.

Some are amazed anyone hankers after a grey communist past. Birthler
remarks: Slaves can’t do anything wrong—and not
everyone likes freedom. Brussig theorises: Many people are
afraid of freedom. They would rather be safe. He adds that the
communist regime suited people you wouldn’t want to talk to
for more than half an hour—emotional and intellectual
primitives. Iris Radisch, a literary critic, praises Wolfgang
Hilbig, the first writer to describe the GDR as it really
was—dead, cold and grey (7). The painter Jens Bisky uses the
term Duldungstarre to describe the Ossi mindset. It’s an almost
untranslatable word used by farmers to describe the look of sows who
are paralysed by the pheromones of the hog as they wait to mate
(8). Dazed and seduced, perhaps.

Intellectuals, Hensel says, wanted to restore democracy in the GDR
and failed. They blame the people. They have no idea what 35%
unemployment means, wrecked lives and a country gone bust. Engler
thinks the snobs’ scornful attitude to ordinary people is
unbearable. As if they wanted to make Ossis pay for their own
failure in 1990. They hate the people who didn’t vote them into
power, preferring reunification and the Deutschmark (9).

The other peoples of liberated eastern Europe were able to keep their
nation states, but not the East Germans. The GDR disappeared and
advocates of reunification did their best to remove all trace of its
existence. Our country no longer existed and nor did we, says
Maxim Leo. His grandfather blames it on the western legal system: A
third of Ossis had to leave their homes, re appropriated by someone
from the West. But not a single one of us benefited from this law -
not even Jews dispossessed by the Nazis.

This is grist to the Ostalgic mill. Anja Weinhold was hurt by the
closure of DT64, a popular radio station: In our village it was the
only link with the outside world.When it stopped I felt like a
foreigner in my own country. Even the Ossis’ favourite
chocolate bar, Raider, was renamed Twix. Vincent Von Wroblewski, a
philosopher, says: By denying our past, they stole our dignity.

For Michael Gauling, former contributor to the satirical weekly
Eulenspiegel, there is a different Ostalgia for each generation:
Young people focus on the 1989-90 revolution which failed but left
a deep impression. Gerhard Leo remembers those feverish months,
torn between the advocates of democracy and their slogan, We are
the people and those in favour of reunification, who replied We
are one people. The GDR was awash with democratic process,
flyers, meetings and demonstrations. Some people still say if only
it could have lasted. But, Leo adds, the Deutschmark prevailed
over the revolution that so many, including communists, had so long
awaited. Kuczynski says many in the West wanted it too: The
leftists involved in the student uprisings of the late 1960s were
counting on the GDR. When the wall fell, they thought it marked
the start of the revolution. After reunification they complained:
‘But why did you sacrifice the alternative society?’

Ostalgia does not only concern the past. We talked to students in a
cafe on Rosa Luxemburg Platz. Uwe Lorenz, computer scientist, said:
In the East the future looks promising for organisations
campaigning for an alternative global market, especially Attac.
The new Länder are more active opponents of Schröder’s
attempts to dismantle the welfare state than their western
counterparts. They are also the first to suffer. In Berlin even
Humboldt University, in the East, now has bigger strikes than the
Freie Universität. Luigi Wolf, a student of political science, is
adamant: the anti-war movement is more radical in the GDR.

The Ossis, explains Lorenz, can draw on a clearer identity
than people in the West, having experienced a form of socialism. If
they think up another form, everything will change. Schelze
interrupts, saying that they know what kind of socialism they want
having been subjected to Stalinism . . . My grandfather used to
say: ‘The GDR isn’t a socialist state.’ It’s
yet to be achieved. We thought it could be done in 1989 and we are
still fighting for it. He is convinced that, with their
experience, Ossis have huge potential. Lorenz rejects any comparison
of Stalinism and capitalism, explaining: The GDR was a bureaucratic
workers’ state, but it was also more egalitarian.

Weinhold is less optimistic. On the basis of past experience, only 2%
of Ossis think they can exert any influence on politicians. The
communist regime did not listen to them, and its capitalist successor
has turned them into second-class citizens. Ostalgia, she adds,
helps them to regain confidence, rehabilitating the parts of
their past that deserve to be saved and defended by collective action:
I know what I feel proud of and want to win back, but also what I
don’t want any more. Lorenz is not so sure: Another world
is possible, but how is it to be achieved? There are only a few
answers to such questions and any reference to Eastern bloc countries
is taboo.

Someone shouted: We should reconcile the movement of emancipation
and our utopian ideals. Von Wroblewski has no intention of giving
up his socialist ideals but you have to make it clear what can and
can’t be done. Commenting on the speed with which Ossis have
matured, he says: History has cheated them so many times they have
no illusions left. Resignation, a complete lack of interest in
politics, and xenophobia are dominant attitudes. And what does he
think of the 25% of the electorate who vote for the Party of
Democratic Socialism (PDS), the rebranded Communist party? He believes
that it reflects the social malaise, rejection of change and longing
for the past. Lacking a plausible alternative, even intellectuals
focus all their energy on careers, trying to find a cosy niche and
adapt to the system. If anything, he suggests, Ostalgia is a
flight from reality for lack of an alternative.

Engler thinks an alternative is taking shape: My optimism has grown
out of the present crisis. More and more people are going to refuse to
accept the consequences. He is convinced of the need for radical
social reforms, unthinkable under the present system, and sees the
GDR’s good points as a utopian possibility based on the
satisfaction of human needs (10). That is why the memory of
1989-90 is important, a time when everyone—workers, farmers and
intellectual—discussed everything. As the former cosmonaut Jähn
says: Doesn’t everybody want a country providing work and
justice for all? He misses its humanism and dreams of a society
based on social justice, devoted to education and culture, without any
exaltation of violence. He adds: We are further away from that
goal now than we were. Dieter Borkowski, a dissident, says, No
one likes to say goodbye to the dreams of their youth.

Bertolt Brecht wrote in a 1953 poem, Der Radwechsel: I am sitting
beside the road/ The driver is changing a wheel/ I don’t like
where I am/ I don’t like where I am going/ Why do I watch the
changing of the wheel/ With impatience?

Notes

(2) Co-founder of New Forum Political Movement in 1989 and member of
parliament until German unification in 1990.

(3) For vehicles filtering right at traffic lights.

(4) Zone kids, a reference to the Soviet zone, as the GDR was often
called.

(5) He was found guilty, without proof, of giving the order to fire on
people trying to escape from the GDR and was sentenced to six and a
half years in prison. He served four, the last two in a day-release
centre. He owes the state500,000.

(6) Die Rache der Ostdeutschen (The vengeance of East Germans) and Im
Westen was neues? (What’s new in the West?), Parthas, Berlin,
2002 and 2003.

(7) Literaturkritik.de, nÂ° 3, March 2002

(8) Berliner Zeitung, Berlin, 11 March 2004.

(9) The Berlin wall fell in November 1989. In the elections in March
1990 the eastern branch of Kohl’s Christian Democrat party, in
favour of reunification, won an easy majority, defeating the civil
rights activists who advocated a separate, but democratic state. The
first pan-German elections were held in December.